Posted on 05/19/2013 6:22:46 PM PDT by pepperdog
I completely understand the criticisms of the FBI (amongst others) but I don’t know anything about a “shoot on sight” policy.
In what context do you mean?
In what context do you mean?
At Ruby Ridge, the FBI HRT commander wrote a rules of engagement memorandum of instruction for his team that included "shoot on sight" rules of engagement. Lon Horiuchi, the HRT sniper who shot and killed Vicki Weaver while she was holding their baby, was operating under this ROE.
I understand. Is that the current ROE as standard procedure?
ROE are mission specific. The on-scene commander issues them based on the situation.
I look to the past actual behavior of the HRT (Waco, Ruby Ridge) for indications of what they are capable of doing, and willing to do.
They literally assassinated an unarmed civilian holding a baby. I have no doubt they would do it again, given the opportunity.
I understand your argument, but must disagree. Although many here on this site rail against local law enforcement having military equipment such as helos, M2 machine guns, M16s, Lenco Bears and Bear Cats (armored vehicles), night vision goggles, infrared goggles, robots, etc, there is such equipment owned by many local law enforcement agencies.
The Officers assigned to these units train regularly with their equipment. They study previous events and practice “what if” scenarios in order to be able to deploy in a moments notice.
While the military does have special units, they have a chain of command that must be followed. Again, time is of the essence. If you doubt that, read the book “Terror at Breslan”.
In addition to the above, I stand by my statement that deploying the military in such a situation is unconstitutional.
I don’t know that it IS unconstitutional, but I agree that it may well be so, which is why I specifically stated so in my original post.
I am not “railing” against this, and I am familiar with the concept of bureaucratic chains, decision-wise, logistically, and materially. I thought I made my point in a non-emotional and rational way. I think many of the other comments on this forum are “railing” or emotionally based, but I thought I made a reasonable and valid point.
I will presume that you agree a chain exists that MUST be followed in all organizations that would be capable of carrying out this mission. I think we could both agree that the decision chain between the US Military, the FBI and a State Police might differ materially in practice, but I don’t readily agree that one is defacto going to be better than the others.
Additionally (just for example) if there are maritime/naval assets needed that are required to carry out an offshore task in a given location (and the FBI doesn’t have the assets with performance/range/firepower to carry out the task) won’t the FBI have to include another branch (such as the US Navy) in its process?
My point is, when minutes count, it is going to be generally hours to react whether it is the military, the FBI or the State Police.
I did not specify that you were “railing”, it was a general statement.
Again, I would not be willing to wait for days for the military chain of command to be followed when an immediate reaction team can be deployed in minutes. I see such teams respond frequently. There is a difference between having gunships with an HRT respond on the high seas to having a SWAT team respond to an active shooter situation at a school.
As far as the constitutional issue, I will invite you to read:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3022018/posts
My issue is not with the Posse Comitatus act or what it covers.
You and I can both agree that there can be all the constitutional protections, laws, and safeguards in place, but if they are not observed, then they aren’t worth the paper they are written on.
Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn had a great passage in “The Gulag Archipelago” where he talked about what a perfect document the Soviet Constitution was. It just wasn’t followed.
I don’t know what the answer is, but in a time of increasing government power (and that includes town and state government as well) I think there has to be a viable recourse to giving every town and municipality helicopters, boats, night vision and automatic weapons to man their SWAT teams, bomb teams and so on.
I think it is dangerous to concentrate power in those areas, and I certainly don’t think it is cost effective.
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